The prior art has suggested many approaches for maintaining a pair of assembled electrical connectors together. One such approach includes providing one connector with a plurality of spaced bayonets which are located within similarly spaced detents carried by the coupling nut when the assembly is fully mated. One such example is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,984,811 to Hennessey, et al.
Other examples of methods of maintaining connectors together are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,594,700; 3,601,764; and 4,066,315 and British Pat. No. 1,181,236. These patents have the general limitation that the mechanism for preventing accidental decoupling of the connectors is either complex, unreliable, costly to manufacture, or provides an undesirable hinderance to either assembly or disassembly when desired.
The reference Connector Spring/Ratchet Patent overcomes most of these limitations by providing a connector assembly which resists accidental decoupling while being relatively inexpensive to manufacture and assemble. The connector assembly disclosed in that patent includes a leaf spring mounted to the coupling nut and ratchet teeth carried on the outside of the connector. In the use of such connector assemblies, it has been noted that all types of leaf springs are not equal in performance. Metallic springs, which are probably first considered material, have several undesirable features. Repeated coupling and decoupling of the connectors causes a wearing or degradation of the metallic ratchet teeth and/or the spring, due to the metal-to-metal contact. The wearing of the metallic teeth creates metal particles or debris which accumulate within the area of the mating spring and teeth to interfere with the interaction between the spring and the teeth. Further, the wear of the spring creates an unpredictable and poor seating of the spring within the ratchet teeth that reduces the effectiveness of the decoupling mechanism. Lubrication to minimize the wear adds to the assembly cost and also presents a continuing maintenance factor which is undesirable.
Further, the manufacture of the metallic spring for the referenced Connector Spring/Ratchet Patent requires the two forming steps during manufacturing, one to produce a spring element, the second to produce the enlargement medially along the length. The second operation adds expense to the manufacturing process. Further, the use of the metallic spring limits the possible configurations of the enlargement which could be formed thereon.
Accordingly, the prior art systems for preventing accidental decoupling of mated electrical connectors had undesirable disadvantages.